The Intellectual Property Renaissance in Cyberspace: Why Copyright Law Could Be Unimportant on the Internet

ERIC SCHLACHTER

1/01/2005
(Original Publish Date: 1997)

Influential futurist Ithiel de Sola Pool wrote: "For copyright, the implications [of electronic publishing] are fundamental. Established notions about copyright become obsolete, rooted as they are in the technology of print. The recognition of a copyright and the practice of paying royalties emerged with the printing press. With the arrival of electronic reproduction, these practices become unworkable. Electronic publishing is analogous not so much to the print shop of the eighteenth century as to word-of-mouth communication, to which copyright was never applied." The emergence of electronic networks has undeniably placed significant pressure on our existing intellectual property system. As with each new technological advance, copyright law must adjust to fit the new circumstances presented by the Internet. Until law and technology reach an equilibrium, many predict that intellectual property creators will be reluctant to create works for the Internet environment since creators will be unable to protect their copyright interests. Others have argued that only minor adjustments are necessary to fit copyright law to electronic networks such as the Internet. Still others-a distinct minority-believe that copyright law has become less important in the age of electronic networks, and that production of intellectual property will continue unabated even without powerful copyright rights. Unlike Professor Pool, we have the benefit of a few years of empirical evidence to draw upon in analyzing the effects of electronic networks on intellectual property. This article analyzes some of the lessons we have learned in the commercial Internet's toddler years to glean some insights into the implications for copyright law and Internet-based commerce. After analyzing recent economic, business, sociological and technological developments, this article concludes that, while copyright law has a role to play on the Internet, other developments overshadow copyright law as a tool for conforming behavior such that copyright law may be unimportant to the Internet. The public policy implications are clear: the business models, sociology and technology of the Internet are evolving so rapidly that efforts to conform copyright law to this environment would be detrimental.